Roman Chronicles: Book 2, Gatherings: Chapter 2: Finding the Entrance

Jamie looked at me nervously. "Erm, you sure? I mean, I wouldn't want to go to Tartarus." Nico nodded. "Hey, my dad's the Underworld guy, but Tartarus? No sir, not me, not today." He said quickly. I stared at them. "You guys! You knew we would have to take a few risks. What's the matter with you?" Nico perked up. "Hey! You know what? Chiron gave me a map of the Underworld, and he said it was the only true map there was. So here." He showed us the map. There was four sections. The top-right was and island that shimmered the color of crystal, and had palm trees dotting it. A pure-white river flowed around the second, and inside of it was dark black. Grey trees were scattered in the blackness. The third was red and orange, around the paper and trees sprang up, but they were dark black with horrid Greek sayings carved into the night-colored wood. I realized there were thousands and millions of creatures, humans, and things roaminlike flames. There were skulls every now and then in the fiery vastness. The fourth was like smoke. It swirled around. The map was 3D, so everything was gridded in color. Nico grinned, then said, "Look at this." He reached his hand over to a large Titanoboa. It glided over a quivering person in the fields of punishment. He grabbed it, then threw the tiny picture to the ground. It enlarged into a gigantic snake. It had its eyes closed, and bobbed its head to Nico, snarling. Nico put a hand on it, and it opened its dark, brooding eyes. I stuck out the forked tongue and shook it around. Then it went in the direction of the fields of punishment. He pointed to where we were on the map. The Titanoboa was slithering in the opposite direction. Jamie flipped her hair back and took out a mirror. "Loose hair is bad in Tartarus." She said casually. She rummaged through her bag and took out an electric hairdryer. She looked in some more and found a makeup kit. She fixed her hair into a braid, perfectly applied a few several layers of gold-and-red-a-luscious, [Author's Note: I'm not kidding. I saw them at the store. There was green-and-pink-a-luscious, love-and-peace-a-luscious LIMITED, and gold-and-red-a-luscious. They were actually quite pretty.] and some light pink blush with a dab of eye shadow. She came out looking nice, but kind of... snobby. She took the shining green map from Nico's pocket and threw it onto the ground. It spread by itself. Jamie smiled at Nico. "See? You don't need to unroll it." Nico looked. "Mm." He said. Jamie scanned the map a few dozen times. Then she said, "Done." The map rolled up. Nico picked it up and put it back in his backpack. We walked, walked, and walked some more. Then Nico collapsed. "Sheesh. If I walk another step, I'm gonna go jump in the Fields of Punishment," He sighed. "I'm hungry." He added with emphasis. Jamie nodded, agreeing. Even I was a little tired. Jamie's stomach rumbled. "Okay, okay. What do you want, Roman?" I looked at her. "What?" She grinned devilishly. "I sneaked a few dozen plates and goblets. Nico and I sat up. "Let's eat!" We all said in unison. Two or three minutes later, Nico already had eaten half of his Ambrosia block. Jamie was polishing off of the last few bites of her pizza. Me? I was already through a hotdog. Nico finished his quite large block of Ambrosia without being reduced to ashes, and was drinking his fourth goblet of Nectar. He was always in tip-top shape nowadays. Guess the Ambrosia and Nectar payed off. Nico wiped his mouth with the blackened used-to-be-dark-gray-but-it-doesn't-matter-anyway sleeve. Jamie carefully dabbed at the corners of her mouth with a pearl-white rose-embroided silk handkerchief. I wiped it onto my ash-covered skin. The horrible taste of ash tickled my tongue, but I dealt with it and stood up. Nico took his goblet half-filled with Nectar, and said, "Bottoms up, I guess." He sipped away the rest. We all yawned and stretched out.

"Oh, Hades'll never believe me. Usually you don't find your son-in-law and two Camp girls sleeping on a few hard rocks in the Underworld." I slowly blinked open my eyes. The first thing I saw were her eyes. Crystal green. They were opened in a kind way, but smarted when they passed over Nico. She had dark, dark, every-so-dark black-brown hair, Asian/Caucasian skin, guess she was a mix, elegant hands, and.... her dress was.... uh. Odd? No, that was understating it. It shone bright golden, with bright, bright bronze daisies scattered like pollen in the wind. It was a tube dress that went to her ankles, and was ruffled and slightly frayed from a few inches below her knees to the bottom. Around her dress at her waist was a lopsided black belt with a silvery buckle. It was studded with Topaz and flowers were sewn on. She had copper-colored shoes with silver puffs at the toes and high heels. Her hair was tied into a delicate, perfectly made braid and thrown over her shoulder, which would have made Jamie so jealous she would turn emerald green. [Author's note: Sorry. That was a long description. I just really felt I had to describe ALL OF IT.]
"Oh, no. You're Persephone, aren't you?" I asked. She nodded, and the daisies changed into tiger lilies. I poked Nico and Jamie. They sat up groggily and rubbed their eyes. Nico's head went boing! He sprang to his feet. "I. Smell. Flowers." He snarled. Jamie stood up and smiled. "It smells jolly nice, too." She added. Nico glared at her. He looked up at Persephone with a look so deadly, I would have been running off by now. Persephone winced, a little, and I put my hand on the hilt of my sword. Nico already had his Stygian blade glinting in the faint light of the Underworld. Persephone loomed over Nico. "Helloooo. What are you doing here?" We all looked at her with fire in our eyes. "Nothing." Jamie and I said while Nico said, "Go away." He added with a snarl, "NOW!" Persephone slowly walked away. I rolled my eyes. "Now, are we going towards Tartarus? We need to be already jumped in by the time it's erm... any time, soon." I glanced at my watch, but the arrows were spinning in circles. Persephone immediately zoomed back. "Tartarus? I'm not letting you! Even Hades cares about his own ignorant son. You. Will. Die." That was enough warmness for Nico, and he froze in place. [Author's Note: Excuse the redundantness.] Seeing that Nico was useless, I pulled out my sword and slashed Persephone on the head. She screamed, gold covering my sword and her head. I muttered to Jamie and Nico, "Run!" All of us darted in the direction of Tartarus, Persephone close behind. We saw a hole, and I didn't even stop. I took Jamie and Nico's hand, held it as tight as I possibly could, and jumped.

It was long. I landed on what seems glass. Nico had a few cuts on the arm, and Jamie too. But when I stood up, it was PAINFUL. Nico and Jamie slowly sat up. "Guys..." I said weakly. "This is Tartarus. My powers... come in handy here." I put up a hand slowly. Hephaestus.... grant me your power. Concrete built up into a one-story house, with windows of brown glass we landed on. It wasn't noticeable, which was good. It was dark grey, and the roof was magma red. It looked like a volcano. Jamie rushed and opened the door, and Nico pulled me in. I blacked out.

I woke up, and my leg was in a splint. I was in a a black-sheet bed. It felt so good after sleeping on a rock, I felt like a queen. "Hey Jamie." Jamie perked up. "Nick--- um, Nicky--- um, Nell--- oh, Nico! Nico, she woke up!" He zoomed over. "Thanks, so much. We wouldn't have been living right now. For hell, we saw HYPERION!" My jaw dropped. "No way!" Nico nodded. "Oh, breakfast--or lunch---or dinner, we have no idea which, is on the table." I sat up and walked over to another room. There was a black-wood table with three plates and three goblets. There weren't any chairs. Or napkins. Jamie noticed me looking. "Yeah, that's the thing. We have no water to clean ourselves, everything we touch tastes like ashes, and no napkins to wipe off just a bit of ash. So--" I cut her off and raised my hand.
Hygeia, grant me your power. 
All the ash immediately fell below us, and a tub filled with water appeared, along with napkins. Jamie stared. "Who the heck did you call for?"
"Hygeia, goddess of hygiene, sanitation, cleanness, etcetera, etcetera."
Jamie shrugged and walked over to the table. I raised my hand and called for Hephaestus. Chairs appeared. Jamie sat down. She looked at the plate. "Ratatouille and bouillabaisse." A weird dish appeared on her plate. The first consisted of a gray-ish, brown-ish soup with full shrimp and roasted eggplant, and the second was quite normal, recognizably ratatouille. It was vegetables sliced in perfect pepperoni shapes. Jamie said to her goblet, "Pomegranate water." I could tell everything she ate was french. Nico said to his plate, "Ambrosia." he took a rather large bite and said, "Nectar." I sat down.

Nico was eating his fifth gigantic square of Ambrosia and was slightly sizzling, like a chicken in a slow cooker. He finished, batted off the crumbs from his mouth, and stood up. He slung his pack over his shoulder and started walking. Jamie and I looked at each other, shrugged, and followed him. My leg was starting to burn, and I had no idea why. I kept on walking till I no longer could stand it. I fell onto the floor with my leg feeling overcooked. Jamie looked back. She immediately started shrieking, and at first I had no idea why. Then I looked at my leg. A row of something's teeth were implanted in my leg. They were emitting a fiery bright ooze. Jamie stared at it for a few more moments. Then she took something out of her bag, that sort of looked like a cross between an iPhone 6 and a radio transmitter. She pointed it at my leg. It beeped for some moments then started talking.

Lydianen, a rare infection caused by implant of Lydian Drakon teeth. Very complicated to prevent from happening, as the teeth are invisible when touching ground. If the infection already is happening, you may experience drowsiness, a burning sensation, a craving for walnuts, and/or a temporary passion for murder.  
There is no way of curing this.

Nico thought about it. "We could just leave you here, but I'm thinking that would almost be murder."
Jamie shot a look at him. She took out the teeth, cleaned off the fiery stuff, rubbed on ointment, stitched it up really neatly, and then rummaged in her bag more. She came up with hot pink gauze, covered in Taylor Swift signatures. "No thanks." I said quickly. She took three more. The first was brown, second red with hearts, and third white with silver deer silhouettes, silver bow and arrows, and the words Hunter of Artemis etched on.
"Jamie, what's the third from?"
"What third one?" She said, quickly stuffing the third into her bag.
"Jamie, take it back out. I'll ask one more time. What's the third from?"
Jamie suddenly found interest in twiddling her thumbs. After a few moments, she took the gauze from her bag reluctantly. But she was quiet.
"Jamie!" The fiery pain in my leg was gone, but I took no notice.
After numerous orders, begs, and pleads, she finally told me.
"Hunter of Artemis. I...." She trailed off.
"You what?"
"I... used to......... used to........... Roman, I used............... I used to be a Hunter of Artemis!"
I stopped. "What?"